An interactive Web documentary, which you can see online at French newspaper Libération, RdC (as it will surely become known when it becomes a cult hit in the subgenre of EP shorts) combines the harshly-lit aesthetics of “Primer” with the political chicanery of a profanity-free “The Thick Of It” to create an interactive Web experience that brings the thrilling intensity of European parliamentary committee meetings to those who aren’t lucky enough to witness these gladiatorial combats of rhetoric in person. As Jean-Luc Godard said: “Film is truth 24 times a second, and every cut is a lie.”

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In truth, it’s an interesting approach to Web-based film-making where you can pull down menus of tags to understand more about the parliament, the aims of the crisis committee and the intricacies of the EU’s Stability and Growth Pact. This makes it easier to follow than the transparent balls film which promoted innovation in Europe through the medium of clean-cut euro-types taking an elevator to the future –- though only, like so much art cinema, if you understand French.

RdC’s star, the French socialist MEP Pervenche Beres, does lots of dramatic striding around the controversial glass atrium of the European Parliament in Strasbourg, before she explains the intricacies of the voting process on the hotly-debated Paragraph 63, which calls for a financial transaction tax. The “Shower Scene from Psycho“? Forget it. When it comes to the film-maker’s art of building dramatic tension, watching Ms. Beres explain how the centre-right European People’s Party asked for an oral amendment relating to the wording of the interim report is an adrenalin-fuelled, edge-of-your-seat ride to the very heart of the European parliamentary legislative process.

So, for the MEP assistants, lobbyists and everyone else not lucky enough to be jetting off to watch Hollywood’s finest stroll along the Croisette (i.e. pretty much everyone), there will be a panel discussion of the film and canapés in Strasbourg tonight.

About Real Time Brussels

The Wall Street Journal’s Brussels blog is produced by the Brussels bureau of The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires. The bureau has been headed since 2009 by Stephen Fidler, who was previously a correspondent and editor for the Financial Times and Reuters. Also posting regularly: Matthew Dalton, Viktoria Dendrinou, Tom Fairless, Naftali Bendavid, Laurence Norman, Gabriele Steinhauser and Valentina Pop.